Assistant to the Villain (Assistant to the Villain, #1)

by Hannah Nicole Maehrer

She’d been called many disparaging things in her life. Alarmingly all beginning with the letter F. Flighty, foolish, forgetful, and, by a strange turn of events, she was finally able to add the final F. Fucked.

The Villain looked around at the blackness, and for the first time since she had encountered him, she saw a truly wicked glint in his eyes. He belonged to this, the night, the darkness. It was his. And Evie…was still not afraid. So incredibly odd.

“Normal” was for those who didn’t have the ability to stretch their minds past the unreachable end.

The working of her mind was unlike anything he’d ever seen. It was almost as if every thought, every word said, made the nonsensical wheels of her mind turn until she could make sense of them in her own specific way. It was surprisingly intriguing. It was… Disgustingly distracting, and he hated it.

She was smart, conniving in a way she couldn’t quite see, but there was a quiet ruthlessness to her that was so disarming coming from someone who seemed to dole out kindness like it was candy.

“Fluffy? You looked at me and thought to yourself, He looks like a Fluffy?”

“I would never make the mistake of underestimating a woman like you. It would be a fatal one.”

She steadied him like an anchor to a wayward ship, and he couldn’t resist bringing her near so that he would not drift too far into his hatred.

It was ironic that a man who dealt with so much death seemed to have brought her back to life,

I want to know you. Trystan felt unfettered fear as he sat there, because for the first time in a decade, the idea of that didn’t sound so very bad. And yet, he somehow knew in his bones she was going to be the death of him eventually.

Problem number one: She was growing emotionally attached to her boss. Problem number two: Her boss was also the most hated man in her kingdom. Problem number three: Someone wanted her boss dead—which would severely affect problem number one.

A yellow flower among the undergrowth left in the forest caught his eye, and his mind conjured an image of Sage. Ruined. He didn’t feel ruined with Evie, though. He felt reborn.

Of all the foolish, horrific things he’d ever accomplished, falling in love with a woman he so completely didn’t deserve made the top of his list.

Evangelina Celia Sage was woven into his being; in the blink of his eyes, in the crinkle of his smile, in his rusty unused laughter, she was there. From the moment he’d met her, he thought of her like the sun. Bright and vibrant, untouchable. But he was wrong. She wasn’t light; she was color. Every single one, dancing otherworldly and bright over his unworthy eyes. She was the explosion of the vivid gleams and glows of the world around him, like a constant rainbow, shining not after the rain but during. She was everything he never deserved but longed for anyway.

“We’re all monsters in the end. At least mine lives in the light.”

Evie made her way to the stairs down to the dungeon. Quietly vowing to herself that she would save The Villain… Or become one trying.